“I’m surprised, I’m baffled, I’m angry,” said City Councilmember Sandy Nurse, who represents East New York, where the city ran an earlier basement conversion pilot in 2019. The area is excluded from the new program, which will only apply to 15 of the city’s 59 community districts.

Adi Talwar

Homes on Cleveland Street near Arlington Avenue in Brooklyn Community District 5, where the city launched a basement/cellar conversion pilot program in 2019. A new initiative authorized by the recent state budget excludes the area.

A new pathway for the legalization and conversion of basement and cellar apartments in the city was included in this year’s state budget—but excludes many of the neighborhoods hardest hit by flooding in recent years.

Housing advocates have long called for a plan to regulate the estimated tens of thousands of subgrade apartments across the city, often low-cost units rented by working class and immigrant New Yorkers. Most existing basement and cellar homes are occupied illegally, making them more vulnerable to unsafe conditions, and tenants now face increased risk of flooding in the face of climate change-driven extreme weather.

“I was a brand new governor for about a week when Hurricane Ida hit. I walked those streets in Queens. I saw what happened in places and homes where people were flooded and literally drowned in their own home because they were trapped in those illegal basement apartments,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said on WNYC’s The Brian Lehrer Show last week. “That was one of the reasons I said we must bring them into code.”

But in a surprise, only a single Queens community district—CD 2, which encompasses Long Island City—was selected to participate in the pilot program authorized by the state budget, despite the wider region’s susceptibility to flooding and the basement drowning deaths of 11 people in other parts of the the borough during Hurricane Ida in 2021.

A total of 15 community districts were selected to participate in the five-year pilot, including four in the Bronx (districts 9, 10, 11, and 12), four in Brooklyn (districts 4, 10, 11 and 17), and six in Manhattan (district 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 and 12), but only one in Queens and none on Staten Island.

Just as surprising was the exclusion of Brooklyn Community District 5 (CD5) in East New York, which was the guinea pig for an earlier basement legalization pilot attempted under Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration in 2019.

“This was a surprise. I’m extremely disappointed that CB5 was specifically excluded from this effort,” said City Councilmember Sandy Nurse, who represents the 37th Council District that includes Brooklyn CD5. 

That earlier pilot program, while stymied in its reach by funding issues and other complications, also saw significant interest from property owners who wanted to take part. 

“This would have been a home run for any state elected official to come back to CB5 and say [that] we got this for the district, given that almost 1,000 households wanted to participate,” Nurse added.

Now, the onus lies with the city to devise and implement the pilot program. Projects in the community districts selected by the state would, in essence, be exempt from parts of the state’s Multiple Dwelling Law (MDL), which regulates the construction, maintenance, and safety standards of buildings containing three or more residential units.  

It was a major barrier to the success of the city’s earlier East New York pilot, kicking in when a two-family home sought to legalize its basement or cellar, subjecting those properties to stricter regulatory requirements and driving up the costs of conversions.

The City Council must now pass legislation to institute the new program, define its implementation approach, and decide how or if the MDL exception will function within these community districts, according to a city staffer.

While the budget deal granted the city the authority to establish a legalization program within the designated community districts, it’s separate from any actual funding for conversions, with the financing framework for the pilot still to be determined.

One potential avenue for funding lies in the Plus One ADU program, announced in November, which incorporates a combination of state grants and city funding earmarked for owners to create or convert Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) on their properties, including basements. The program accommodates ADUs compliant with current regulations, which excludes many basement units due to the existing state MDL—though the city could now change that with its newly granted authority.

“We had set aside $85 million for ADU and basement conversions. The city is getting money every year from the state to do that,” said Assemblymember Harvey Epstein, who has sponsored a basement apartment legalization bill since 2021.

“We’ll see if they can use that money to help homeowners who need to do the conversion and assist them in ensuring that there’s affordable housing for them,” said Epstein, who called the budget deal on basements “an important first step.”

The basement initiative comes as the city embarks on an effort to ease other zoning rules to create more housing through Mayor Eric Adams’ City of Yes for Housing Opportunity, for which public review officially kicked off Monday.

Among the changes it seeks to make is to eliminate parking mandates for new residential development, which proved another hurdle for basement conversions in the East New York pilot: 36 percent of properties were dropped from the program during pre-screening because they couldn’t accommodate the required parking, according to a report last year from the Citizens Housing and Planning Council.  

During a City of Yes Zoom press briefing on Friday, Department of City Planning Chair Dan Garodnick discussed how parking mandates had hindered housing creation and that by “eliminating a mandate, we will create much more flexibility for different types of housing across the board.”

“We think it’s important that we have the opportunity for a pilot to legalize basements. And, of course, zoning is a piece of that puzzle, but by no means the only piece of that puzzle. So we were really encouraged by what the state came up with,” he said.

Adi Talwar

Jessica Katz, the city’s former chief housing officer, speaking at a March 2023 rally for basement legalization in Jackson Heights. The neighborhood is excluded from the pilot program authorized by the recent state budget deal.

In a statement following release of the state budget, the BASE Coalition, a collective advocating for a safe pathway for basement apartment legalization, said the program “was long overdue” and would help improve safety in the community boards selected to participate.

“The City of New York now has significant power and opportunity to embark on a basement conversion program in many vulnerable communities,” the group said.

But the Coalition added that it is “extremely disappointed by the geographic limitations of this regulatory relief,” and “concerned by the lack of transparency regarding the selection process for eligible Community Districts.”

Sadia Rahman, deputy director of policy at Chhaya Community Development Corporation and a member of the BASE Coalition, said the city has already learned a lot from the original East New York pilot program. 

“That was the beauty of the East New York pilot; it gave the city the opportunity to look under the hood and really tinker with and identify each of the provisions of the code that would need to be modified in order to make these conversions easier, and so a lot of that work has been done already for the pilot, and we just need to expand that citywide,” said Rahman.

Howard Slatkin, a former deputy at the New York City Department of City Planning and now executive director of the Citizens Housing & Planning Council, another BASE member, also criticized the geographic restrictions, alluding to potential political motives: some state lawmakers have opposed basement legalization, citing safety concerns.   

“Calling this a ‘pilot’ was the fig leaf that allowed them to play politics with boundaries,” said Slatkin. “What we see instead is some version of political boundary salad that the state legislature has put out.” 

State Sen. Brian Kavanagh, who sponsored the broader legalization bill with Epstein, acknowledged the opposition to a more comprehensive initiative. 

“Some of my colleagues have argued that effectively you would be rewarding property owners for doing something that’s improper,” he told City Limits Monday. The smaller pilot, he added, “may allow people who have been skeptical of this approach to see its merits.”

“Getting a pilot in place that will allow the city to design a program, determine which aspects of the MDL are obstacles to legalizing, and making these apartments safe and launching the program is a very significant step forward,” he said.

But Councilmember Nurse called for those who pushed for the geographic exemptions to answer for those exclusions. 

“I’m surprised, I’m baffled, I’m angry,” Nurse said, “and I think whoever got in the way of Community Board 5 participating and moving forward with the work we’ve been doing for almost a whole decade, I think that they’re gonna have to be held accountable for that.”

With additional reporting by Emma Whitford.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Chris@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

Want to republish this story? Find City Limits’ reprint policy here.

The post mortem for the Wild’s 2023-24 season, their second without a postseason appearance in 12 years, was full of disappointed faces. General manager Bill Guerin, coach John Hynes and a phalanx of players all expressed regret at what might have been.

Still, Kirill Kaprizov’s sour puss stood out.

This spring marked the first time in Kaprizov’s professional career that he finished outside of the postseason since 2016-17. Asked if he would watch this year’s NHL playoffs, he said, “I don’t know. I don’t think I want to watch a lot.”

This is not a great sign for the Wild, whose general adequacy has hamstrung its efforts to draft a superstar — and general postseason inadequacy is wearing out its fan base. Now they have a superstar, nabbed in a savvy move by former GM Chuck Fletcher with a fifth-round pick, and after next season he’ll be negotiating a contract extension.

And he’s not happy.

If that sounds familiar it’s because you’re old enough to remember the long contract saga of Marian Gaborik, the Wild’s previous franchise player who ultimately opted to leave for the New York Rangers for less than the Wild were offering.

Is Kaprizov as unhappy as Gaborik was? It doesn’t seem so. But it’s naïve to believe that another season like this one — or, frankly, another season with a first-round playoff exit — won’t be a wobbly platform from which to negotiate a contract extension for one of the NHL’s best players.

“Kirill wants to win. I know that,” Guerin said the day after Minnesota’s season ended with a 4-3 loss to Seattle. “And yeah, I do feel that we need to show him that we’re committed to winning.”

Kaprizov, who joined the Wild after five full seasons in Russia’s elite Kontinental Hockey League is three years into a five-year, $45 million extension that itself was something of a difficult birth. He played 54 playoff games in the KHL and won a championship in 2016-17.

Since arriving, Kaprizov has rewritten the Wild record books, the first franchise player to finish with consecutive 40-goal seasons, three and counting. Starting with the 55-game COVID-19 season in 2020, he has amassed 160 goals and 330 points in 278 games. But Kaprizov has played in only 19 playoff games in Minnesota, and won only seven of them.

Signing a burgeoning star, and restricted free agent, to a five-year deal that makes him a millionaire several times over was the easy part for Guerin. Now, he will have to convince Kaprizov, already a rich man with a rich NHL resume, that staying with his buddies in Minnesota will give him a realistic chance to win a Stanley Cup.

By NHL rules, that can’t start until Kaprizov has finished the penultimate year of his current deal, which means immediately following next season. It’s difficult to overestimate the importance of the 2024-25 Wild not just making the postseason, but winning at least a series to show Kaprizov that the roster is on track for a deep playoff run.

The Wild have several promising prospects — forwards Liam Ohgren and Riley Heidt, goaltender Jesper Wallstedt, defenseman Carson Lambos among them — and good young NHL players in Brock Faber, Marco Rossi and Marat Khusnutdinov. Guerin’s hope is that, soon, those young players meld with veterans such as Jared Spurgeon, Jonas Brodin, Marcus Foligno and Mats Zucarello to create a Stanley Cup contender.

Losing Kaprizov for nothing — they’re not going to trade him — would be catastrophic to everything this franchise has been building.

Marian Gaborik was a very good player, the most talented forward to lace up skates for the Wild. If he continues at this pace, Kaprizov will be a Hall of Fame forward — because he’s getting better. He’s not just preternaturally talented. He has a work ethic and competitive drive, and he turned 27 last week.

“That’s a guy we obviously want to keep happy and make sure that he’s feeling comfortable here and knowing that it’s a team that can get the job done,” alternate captain Marcus Foligno said. “He’s such a huge piece of this team.”

One can make a cogent argument that Kaprizov’s mid-winter rib injury is ultimately what killed Minnesota’s chances of pulling itself out of the 5-10-4 hole they dug early. Three points out when he was hurt Dec. 30 in Winnipeg, the Wild lost seven of their next eight games (1-6-1) without him and never recovered.

“You need superstars to win and to pull you out of holes,” Foligno said. “But at the end of the day, he wants to win a championship. So do we all, so not getting anything done — especially this year — I’m sure he’s very frustrated.”

How frustrated would Kaprizov be after another season like this one?

“I don’t know. We’ll see what happens next year,” he said in his improving English. “I can’t say if we don’t make playoffs. I hope we make playoffs next year.”

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To date, 37,707 NYCHA units are either in the planning and engagement stage, under construction or have already been converted to the Permanent Affordability Commitment Together (PACT) initiative, officials testified at a recent City Council hearing.

Adi Talwar

NYCHA’s Manhattanville Houses in Harlem is among the public housing campuses that have been converted to the PACT program.

During a recent City Council hearing, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) testified that an “incredibly impactful initiative” is bringing in billions of needed dollars to help restore and repair its aging properties.

The initiative referenced was the Permanent Affordability Commitment Together (PACT) program—which converts public housing properties, also known as Section 9, to the federal Section 8 program as a means to unlock additional repair funds. To date, 37,707 NYCHA units are either in the planning and engagement stage, under construction or have already been converted.

As part of the process, NYCHA campuses are turned over to private developers to carry out renovations such as new windows, kitchens, bathrooms and building facades. The new management team also handles the day-to-day operations, while NYCHA continues to own the land.

“Right now, 57 developments are under active construction, representing over $3.9 billion in construction work happening across the city—work that we would not be able to accomplish without PACT considering the lack of federal capital funding available,” Jonathan Gouveia, NYCHA’s executive vice president for real estate development, testified to councilmembers at the April 19 hearing.

NYCHA presented a survey of PACT tenants which showed that 77 percent of respondents were “very satisfied” with renovations to their buildings, 87 percent said they were “likely or very likely” to recommend the PACT program to other NYCHA developments, 78 percent said the grounds were more kempt than before, and close to 70 percent said they feel “more stable” than prior to the conversion.

But some tenants who testified at the Committee on Public Housing hearing painted a different picture. They shared concerns such as getting timely repairs post-conversion, and questioned NYCHA’s process for selecting the campuses it converts to PACT. Councilmembers also had a plethora of questions.

Councilmember Alexa Aviles, the former chair for the public housing committee, asked officials about tenant participation in the survey results they shared, which included responses from residents at just four PACT-converted developments, out of the 138 that are currently under the program or in the process of converting.

Gouveia shared that roughly 1,000 residents from the four developments replied to the survey. It is unclear how many tenants responded from each campus.

“I would love for you to provide for the Council what that breakdown actually looks like,” Aviles said.

Repairs and rights

PACT is New York City’s version of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) program, introduced in 2011. NYCHA developments that convert are also referred to as RAD-PACT properties.

It is one of the programs—alongside the newer Public Housing Preservation Trust—being used to help chip away at the near $80 billion the housing authority says it needs over the next two decades for capital repairs.

When NYCHA tenants have maintenance issues, there are a couple of ways to flag them. Public housing tenants can either call the Customer Contact Center (CCC) or submit a ticket or work order online, where they can track the status of the request.

When a development is transferred to PACT, the new private management team takes over repairs at a development. But the housing authority is responsible for maintenance repairs up until the date of conversion—which can take about two years, according to advocates—potentially leaving tenants in a period of limbo.

Alexandra MacDougall, a staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society, testified about concerns she has heard from clients who live in PACT developments post-conversion.

While NYCHA receives frequent criticism for how it handles repairs and the pace of making fixes—it took the Housing Authority an average of 370 days to complete repair work in March, when the target is 15 days—residents are at least able to track the status of their work order requests online. 

There is no such uniform system for tenants to place work orders at PACT-converted campuses, advocates noted.

 “A lot of tenants tell us there’s not really a clear way to make requests for repairs and to track those requests which is a huge problem,” MacDougall said. “Especially after hours in the evenings and on the weekends when there’s serious issues like boilers going out.”

August Leinbach, a staff attorney at the Manhattan Housing Unit of Legal Services NYC, said tenants they’ve worked with have continued to live in poor conditions post-conversion despite the promise of rehabilitation.

“While the central promise of the RAD-PACT program has… [been] to fund repairs for rehabilitation, this promise often comes slowly, if at all,” said Leinbach.

Different PACT partners use their own tracking software for repairs and are supposed to provide NYCHA with a summary of that data, according to Gouveia. According to NYCHA’s “PACT Project Progress and Compliance Oversight” dashboard, 93 percent of work orders submitted by PACT residents were completed on time as of the third quarter of 2023.

“We track work orders and resolutions of work orders on a monthly basis and overall the performance is strong, well over 90 percent on time,” said Gouveia.

“However, as we’ve heard, sometimes that doesn’t seem to be the case so I would invite the residents to obviously work with their property managers,” he added. “But also if they’re not getting satisfactory answers, they can reach out to us through the PACT hotline, through CCC, through 311, but primarily through us and we’ll look into the issue.”

Which developments get PACT?

In December 2018, NYCHA set a goal to convert 62,000 of its properties to the PACT program by 2028, according to Gouveia. The housing authority has surpassed the halfway mark with more than 37,000 converted units, or units in the process of converting.

NYCHA developments are considered for PACT based on several factors, he said, including the level of deterioration determined by NYCHA’s Physical Needs Assessment (PNA) and the overall quality of maintenance on a day to day basis.

For prospective PACT developments, NYCHA said that the team works with resident leadership and will then have meetings with the development at large to determine if the program is a fit.

One East New York tenant who only wanted to go by the name “Miss Yves” said that she is living in a PACT development, the Penn-Wortman Houses, which was converted in 2021.

 “We didn’t have a choice to vote,” she said.

Brian Honan, the senior vice president of NYCHA’s office of intergovernmental relations, said that the housing authority has no interest in forcing the program onto residents who don’t want it.

“The federal law does not require a percentage of residents to support a PACT project for conversion, however, we have engaged residents at certain sites and they told us they are not interested,” Honan said.

Last year, the housing authority introduced an election process for the first time, by which residents at selected campuses who are over the age of 18 and are on the household composition—a list of authorized tenants who live in the unit—can vote on the future of their homes.

On the ballot is PACT and another funding model called the Public Housing Preservation Trust, signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul in 2022. Under the Trust model, properties will also convert to Section 8 and can unlock funds through bonds for repairs (NYCHA would continue to manage the properties, rather than bringing in private companies, as PACT does.) Residents can also vote to remain in traditional Section 9 public housing.

So far, two developments—Nostrand Houses in Brooklyn and Bronx River Addition Houses—have been allowed to vote on which model they want, and voters at both opted for the Trust.

Other ways of getting tenant input have been introduced, but also faced skepticism. Last year, residents of the Fulton Elliott-Chelsea Houses in lower Manhattan were given a survey to determine whether their properties should get traditional PACT renovations or start from scratch  by way of razing the existing buildings and constructing new towers.

NYCHA announced that a majority of participating residents opted for demolition, but questions arose about how the options were presented,  how many tenants participated and whether the survey was an accurate representation of what the majority of residents want.  

Ramona Ferreyra, a resident of Mitchel Houses in the Bronx, testified as a member of the group Save Section 9, which is fighting to keep units in the traditional public housing program and to see Section 9 funded adequately without shifting units to private management or the Trust. 

“What you’ll know today is that the tenants are telling you that in spite of the tenant repairs that we need, what we want is to keep public housing,” Ferreyra said.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Tatyana@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

Want to republish this story? Find City Limits’ reprint policy here.

Tikki Brown is set to serve as the first Commissioner of the Department of Children, Youth, and Families. (Courtesy of the Office of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan)

Gov. Tim Walz has named a longtime Minnesota Department of Human Services official the first commissioner of a new state government agency that will be responsible for state child care and public assistance programs.

Tikki Brown will head the new Department of Children, Youth and Families when the agency is established in July. Brown is currently the assistant commissioner for Children and Family Services with the Minnesota Department of Human Services, an agency she has worked at since 2001.

“From the initial inception of the new Department of Children, Youth, and Families, I have been excited about the opportunity to create better outcomes for Minnesotans,” Brown said in a statement.

Brown will run an agency handling responsibilities currently held by others, including the Department of Human Services and the Department of Education.

The new Department of Children, Youth and Families will handle child care services, child support, and welfare programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. It also will deal with some juvenile justice-related divisions from the Department of Public Safety.

Brown has served in many roles related to the areas DCYF will cover when it starts operating, according to the governor’s office. In her 22 years at the Department of Human Services, Brown has worked in nutrition assistance and food programs, and climbed into senior administrative roles.

Walz pitched a new state agency focused on youth and families in his 2023 budget recommendations, and DFL lawmakers approved the move during the last session. The new agency was part of the governor’s push to make Minnesota the “best state in the country for kids.”

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